Published May 26, 2023

Watch a video about Alaska's Changing Arctic: Energy Issues and Trends.

In this video, one of five highlighting what the report offers, Pat Pitney (President of the University of Alaska system), Amy Lovecraft (Director of UAF's Center for Arctic Policy Studies), Pearl Brower (President/CEO of Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation), and Glenn Wright (UAS Associate Professor of Political Science), discuss how this report and planned future reports can support Alaska decision-makers with information they need to benefit from and expand the role of Alaska and the United States in the Arctic. 

Published May 26, 2023 by Scienmag

Arctic ground squirrels are unique among mammals. Their ability to keep from freezing even when body temperatures dip below that mark on the thermometer enables them to survive extreme winter climates. New research published in Science analyzes more than 25 years of climate and biological data. The findings include shorter hibernation periods and differences between male and female hibernation periods. Spoiler alert – the girls “rise and shine” a little earlier in response to warming, which could have both positive and negative ripple effects throughout the food web in these ecosystems.  

Senior author Cory Williams, assistant professor in the Department of Biology at Colorado State University, began studying arctic ground squirrels while at the University of Alaska Fairbanks more than 15 years ago. “I think the thing that makes our study unique is that we are looking at a long enough dataset to show the impacts of climate change on a mammal in the Arctic,” said Williams, who joined the CSU faculty in 2021. “We can show a direct link between changes in temperature and the physiology and ecology of these animals.”

Chmura and Williams, along with co-authors, analyzed long-term air and soil temperature data at two sites in Arctic Alaska in conjunction with data collected using biologgers. They measured abdominal and/or skin temperature of 199 free-living individual ground squirrels over the same 25-year period. They found that females are changing when they end hibernation, emerging earlier every year, but males are not. Changes in females match earlier spring thaw. The advantage of this phenomenon is that they do not need to use as much stored fat during hibernation and can begin foraging for roots and shoots, berries and seeds sooner in the spring. Scientists think this could lead to healthier litters and higher survival rates.

The downside is that if the males also do not shift hibernation patterns, there eventually could be a mismatch in available “date nights” for the males and females. Ground squirrels are also an important source of food for many predators, such as foxes, wolves, and eagles. An indirect consequence of being active above ground longer is greater exposure and risk of being eaten.

Published May 25, 2023 by alaskabusiness

The University of Alaska Foundation has a new Chief Financial Officer. Alex Slivka brings more than forty years of experience in accounting, finance, and investments to the nonprofit that stewards the UA System’s philanthropic support.

Published May 25, 2023 by Petersburg Pilot

This month, Alaska Airlines unveiled a new design that replaced the Salmon Thirty Salmon art known by many Alaskans. The new art still features salmon, but this time from an Indigenous perspective. Crystal Worl, Tlingit artist and business owner from Juneau, created the new design in the style of formline art.

The plane is designed in Northwest Coast formline, a style that is characteristic of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian people of Southeast Alaska. Formline art stands out for its unique use of positive and negative space and dramatic colors. These colors, including indigo, pink and white, can be seen gracing the new plane, called X̱áat Ḵwáani, which can be translated from Tlingit to mean "salmon people" in English.

To come up with the title for the new plane design, Worl reached out to X̱'unei Lance Twitchell, a Tlingit language speaker and professor of Alaska Native languages at the University of Alaska Southeast, for advice on what the name should be.

"There must be a million different ways in our language that mean 'our relationship between salmon,'" Worl said. "So he got back to me with some options, and we narrowed it down to X̱áat Ḵwáani, 'salmon people,' because of its translation of how people are connected and relate and benefit from salmon."

"The meaning felt really beautiful," she added.